Mamuka Dideba’s paintings are populated by magical characters inhabiting wondrous worlds outside time and space. Each artwork is a story. So what’s the deal with The Deal? The premise seems simple, right? Of course not.

Set against a cityscape, two figures are exchanging a key for a bag of coins. Our first impression is not positive. Keys are a symbol of power. Over centuries of wars, our minds instinctively react with dread upon seeing an exchange set against the backdrop of a city. It evokes a change of power, a capitulation to a conqueror - tied closely with grief and loss of life.

Diego Velazquez’ celebrated work depicting the Surrender of Breda n the 17th century is a classic example. Velazquez portrays Justinus van Nassau, the leader of the defeated Dutch, surrendering the key to the city to the victorious Spanish General Spinosa, pictured as a magnanimous and almost fatherly figure whose superior military strength is underscored by the raised lances behind him ... The almost congenial composition belies the fact that few Dutchmen and even fewer Spaniards survived the siege of the city.

Yet the Bible reminds us that keys also symbolise spiritual enlightenment and that the giving of a key may be a great gift borne out of love, not conquest. In The Delivery of Keys, the Renaissance painter and Raphael’s teacher Pietro Perugino elegantly illustrates a scene from Matthew 16 where Christ gives “the keys of the kingdom of heaven” to Saint Peter. Here, the keys are an instrument of good - the power to forgive, to ascend spiritually, and to help others do so.

Then what is Mamuka Dideba’s The Deal saying about keys?

Comparing the relationship between the figures involved in the exchange in all three paintigs, whereas in Velazquez’s The Surrender of Breda the Dutch bow before the Spanish and in Perugino’s The Delivery of Keys Saint Peter kneels before Christ, in Dideba’s The Deal the figures are equals.

All right then, you might say, Dideba’s characters are equals and maybe the key has a positive meaning. But what does the bag of money have to do with it? It is unusual to see a painting depicting such an exchange without the slightest hint of treachery.

This brings us to a philosophy Dideba holds dear; specifically, the Apollonian and Dionysian dichotomy best known from Nietzsche’s 1872 book “The Birth of Tragedy”. In Greek mythology, Apollo and Dionysus are both sons of Zeus, the Ruler of all Gods. Apollo governs reason, form and structure (analysis) whereas Dionysus governs ecstasy, emotions, and intoxication (instinct). The Greeks considered these gods as two parts of one whole. Likewise, Nietzsche argued that the presence of both rationality and instinct is imperative in the creation of the arts.

For Dideba, the key is Apollonian and represents ownership of a physical thing. Through reason and analytical thinking people use possessions, such as cars or houses, as rational expressions of their individuality. There is no judgment here - possessions are simply an expression of our Apollonian side, they are neither good nor bad.

The pouch with money is Dionysian. Money can be spent in the heat of the moment, with great abandon, to forget your woes or to celebrate your wins, or simply on an impulse-buy of some widget conveniently placed at the supermarket checkout.

Apollonian reason and Dionysian emotions form a balanced whole. In their exchange the characters in The Deal complete each other. It is no wonder that such good will and kindness emanate from their faces.

There is much more to this painting, more magic hidden in the composition of the city, the whimsical costumes of the figures, and even the facial details. But one story at a time.

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For Mamuka Dideba’s bio and other works, click here